Chapter VI Waiting and Trusting
As Mrs. Crook entered, a welcoming hand was extended to her, and the sweet voice which she had always liked to hear, though she could scarcely tell why, said, “I am so glad to see you, dear Mrs. Crook. It is very good of you to come. You will sit near me, will you not? For I cannot speak loudly or for long together.”
“It is very good of you to let me come,” said Mrs. Crook, as she held the white hand gently between both of her own, for a moment, and then laid it reverently down on the white counterpane. “I was sorry to hear of your illness. But,” she added, in a hopeful tone, “I trust you will get better. You do not look ill, and you have quite a beautiful colour in your cheeks. Maybe the doctors are mistaken.”
Mrs. Crook knew that it depressed sick people sometimes to be told that they were not looking well. She was glad that she could honestly say the contrary to Miss Lawton.
The sick girl smiled, as she answered, “You know the old saying, ‘while there is life, there is hope.’ I have so many to love that for their sakes I might wish to live, but God has enabled me just to leave myself in His hands. To live and work for Him would be very sweet. To depart and be with Christ far better still. I have only to wait and trust. All will be well.”
The sweet low tones of the sick girl’s voice fell like music on Mrs. Crook’s ear, and they went to her heart and filled it with a strange new longing—a deep desire to know what it was which filled the speaker’s whole being with measureless content and peace, that made her face radiant with love and joy, that enabled her to set such little store by the best this world could offer.
In broken words, which she could hardly recognise as her own, Mrs. Crook managed to tell Miss Lawton what she felt, and to add—
“I have always hated to think about death, and counted a long life here as the thing most of all to be wished for; please tell me how it is you are not afraid to die?”
The sick girl’s face grew brighter still as she listened. The inquiring words were surely an answer to her prayer that Mrs. Crook’s coming might be helpful to the good of her soul. So, once again, she told how the old (but ever new) story of God’s love for sinners had been brought home to her own heart, and how she had been enabled to see her own sinfulness and need of a Saviour, and how she had found one in Jesus.
She spoke of His life, His love, His death, His tender compassion for a lost and ruined world, His willingness to receive, His many invitations to each weary and heavy laden soul, His promise, His victory over sin, Satan, and the grave, of the glory He had laid down for a time, but which He had taken again, and which every believer should share with Him in heaven.
“Believing in His love, do you wonder, dear Mrs. Crook, that, while I feel it sweet to serve and trust Him here, I feel that it will be sweeter still to have the precious promises all fulfilled, and to be with Jesus for ever and ever? In the presence of Jesus is fulness of joy. Once there, sorrow and sighing would flee away, and I should just be looking forward to meeting again those I loved on earth, and who loved Jesus. My dear parents, my Sunday scholars, your and my little Fanny amongst the rest, and you, too, Mrs. Crook.”
A groan came from the person thus addressed, and down the face that mostly had such a hard stern expression, the big tears chased each other, whilst in a voice broken by sobs she cried—
“I have never loved Jesus; I have loved nobody but myself! It would be of no use to look for me there.”
Again the girl took up the sweet words of invitation, “‘Come unto me;’ ‘I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance;’ ‘Whosoever will, let him come,’” with many another message which came straight from the very lips of Jesus when on earth, and told her visitor how they had been brought home to her own heart. There was no preaching as it seemed in her way of speaking. It was only just telling what the Lord had done for her soul, and she could say, “What God has done for me, He is ready and willing to do for you; His words are, ‘Him that cometh unto me, I will in no wise cast out.’”
Happy Agnes Lawton, in being able thus to speak of her Saviour’s love. Happy Mrs. Crook, in being at last made willing to listen to the precious message.
Not that Mrs. Crook felt glad at heart. On the contrary, she was sorely troubled; but, though she did not yet realise it, she was on the way to happiness. The Holy Spirit was striving with her and bringing the words of the young disciple home with power.
Her hard heart was softening beneath this Divine influence. The eyes of her understanding were being enlightened, and at that moment it could have been said of Mrs. Crook for the first time in her life, “Behold she prayeth,” though no human ear caught the sound of words, and only the great Searcher of hearts knew of the yearning cry for pardon which was going out from hers.
“Agnes, darling. I fear you have talked too long.”
The voice was that of Mrs. Lawton, who, fearing for her daughter, now entered the room.
“I am sure you would not wish your visit to do her harm,” she said, turning to Mrs. Crook.
“Not for all the world,” was the answer, though it was with difficulty the words were uttered. “I don’t know how to thank you for letting me come.”
“It has not hurt me, mother,” said Miss Lawton. “I am a great deal happier for having seen Mrs. Crook,” and truly the sweet face shone with a holy joy as she looked at her visitor.
Mrs. Crook took up the little white hand again and held it tenderly, as she whispered, “Pray for me. God will hear you.”
“And you and all who come in the name of Jesus,” replied the girl.
Then she put her disengaged arm round Mrs. Crook’s neck, and, drawing her gently towards her, she kissed her, as a loving child might have done.
“Good-bye, dear Mrs. Crook,” she said. “If we do not meet again here, may we meet in heaven.”
Mrs. Crook had longed to kiss the white hand that lay in hers, but she felt afraid to take such a liberty. She could hardly believe her senses when Agnes Lawton’s arm clasped her neck, and her lips pressed loving kisses on her cheeks.
How many years had passed since Mrs. Crook last felt the touch of young lips there, or indeed of any? She had never been a demonstrative woman, and her childless condition had helped to dry up any little wellspring of tenderness in her nature, if any such existed. But that unexpected embrace, that pure caress, stirred her as she had never been moved before, not only to thankfulness for the lovingkindness it manifested, but to regretful thoughts, as she looked into the past and knew what she had lost by those years of hardness and loneliness.
It is not for us to trace, step by step, the change which had its beginning, as we have already seen, through the simple words of a little maidservant, and the love for souls which burned in the heart of a young disciple of Jesus. We will rather pass by these years, and look at Mrs. Crook after the interval.
Surely that is she who is making a group of little children happy, by leading them through her pretty garden and telling them the names of the flowers which she plucks from time to time, and ties up in small nosegays which they will carry back with them to brighten their dingy homes.
Of course these are not all the same children who were once driven away with hard words and threats, for some of those are at work already, helping to earn their bread. They look much cleaner too, though their clothes are poor and in some cases, ragged.
But Mrs. Crook has found that she can influence the little ragamuffins for good, by means of a gift of flowers, for it is understood that dirty hands and faces do not match with these fair blossoms, and the small people vie with each other in holding out a clean palm to receive them.
Mrs. Crook has found these kind words avail more than sharp ones, and that a great deal of happiness may be diffused at a very small cost, not that she grudges anything now for such a purpose.
At church, mistress and maid occupy two seats in the same pew, and the third is always at the service of any stranger who requires one.
Of course, too, since God opened Mrs. Crook’s heart, she has been willing to open her hand and her purse, and all who work for Him find in her a willing helper. No more hoarding—Mrs. Crook has become a cheerful giver.
Her little maid resembles the Fanny of three years ago, but can hardly be the same, unless time has stood still with the girl.
Mrs. Crook’s present domestic is the younger sister of her old one, and Fanny is the happy mistress of a neat little home of her own, and the wife of a worthy young man, a neighbour’s son.
Miss Lawton’s life was considerably prolonged, and she had the joy of knowing that her words had been blessed to Mrs. Crook.
The latter seems full of love and goodwill to all the world. She once cared only for herself, but since Christ has filled her heart there has been no place for self, though there is room in it for everybody else.
Truly the heroine of this little story may now well be called, Comfortable Mrs. Crook.
It may be added that Agnes Lawton was no ideal character. The original, a most beautiful girl, was well known to the writer. She died nearly twenty years ago, but many of her actual words are noted in this little story.